Pakistan is close to completing a second plutonium-producing reactor, and is well into building a third, and these reactors could increase its ability to make atomic bombs, a United States think-tank said on Thursday.
"The wider implication ... (is that) there is a real risk this will exacerbate an India-Pakistan nuclear arms race and increase tensions more broadly between the two," the Institute for Science and International Security (ISIS) said in a report.
The report included commercial satellite images taken two weeks ago and in February and May showing construction of the second and third Khushab complexes. The 10-page report estimated the reactors would run on power of "about 100-megawatts or more", which could enable the two combined to yield plutonium for 8 to 10 atomic bombs a year.
Pakistan has an operating heavy-water reactor and heavy-water production plant already at Khushab.
A row of cooling towers indicated the second reactor was close to completion and could be ready to operate in a year's time, according to the 10-page report. "Once completed, these reactors will increase several-fold Pakistan's ability to make weapons-grade plutonium (fuel)." "When finished...will allow a significant increase in the quantity and quality of Pakistan's nuclear weapons." |